Camera phones and privacy: Introducing ’Creepshots’

The new technologies of the 21st century have not only made our lives easier and more entertaining, but have also raised new issues to tackle and posed new questions to answer. One of these serious problems still waiting to be solved is the issue of privacy. With the camera phones and tablets of today, taking photographs has become extremely quick and easy. Taking a shot of something or someone is literally just a touch away. Due to the compactness and ubiquitousness of smart phones, it has become much easier to take the photograph, even secretly if the subject does not want it to be taken. But we should also stop and think about the ethics of taking a photograph of an unsuspecting subject. With camera phones now so widespread, the difficult question of whether the law itself should tackle this issue somehow arises.

There are many websites and blogs in cyberspace dedicated to photos taken of unsuspecting people. These are being run for different reasons and cater to different tastes, but they are all the product of, and celebrate, the kind of voyeurism we all have in ourselves in certain measures. Some of these websites may seem more harmless than others. A blog called Everybody Reading Books (previously named Hot Guys Reading Books) features candid pictures of mostly attractive people reading. Another example, TubeCrush is a British website for women and gay men to upload candid pictures of men they find attractive on the London Underground.

These examples, even though they do violate the privacy and individual rights of the subjects, may still seem fairly tame ones. But there is one trend in the candid photo sharing community of the Internet, which takes it many steps too far. Misogyny, sexual harassment, and sexual objectification of women go a long way back in history, but combined with these new technologies, the camera phone and the Internet, they have taken a new and particularly nasty form. It is a very specific form of harassment directed against women online, called a creepshot.

A creepshot is a candid picture taken of a woman, usually of her rear end or cleavage in tight or revealing clothing, entirely without her knowledge or consent. One subgenre of creepshots is the upskirt, when the photo is specifically taken of the underwear of the subject wearing a skirt. They are then uploaded on a blog or forum with some misogynystic caption, such as ”Begging to be raped.”

The main platform for sharing creepshots was for a long time a subReddit called CreepShots, which was shut down by Reddit in 2012 because of the many complaints they received. Since then, it has returned. Operating under the name CandidFashionPolice, it disguises itself as a fake "fashion police" forum, badly trying to hide what it is by posting criticism with the pictures, criticising outfits. However, they only post pictures of women in revealing outfits, usually from the back.

The creators, contributors and visitors of these forum sites are obviously some kind of fetishists, stating categorically that the only photos they are interested in are the ones where the subject is entirely unaware of what is happening. "A creepshot captures the natural, raw sexiness of the subject without their vain attempts at putting on a show for the camera." stated the original CreepShots subReddit as its main rule.

There have been several unsuccessful attempts at outlawing creepshots. A most recent example occurred in Texas, where the highest court refused a new anti-creepshot law, deeming it unconstitutional and a violation of free-speech. Another case happened in Massachusetts, when a man was caught habitually taking upskirt photos on a subway train, but in the end, the First Amendment protected him, as well.

Of course, several questions arise, such as whether banning this outrageous activity would really solve the problem. If so, should creepshots be banned or all candid photography on the streets. The problematic nature of enforcing such a restrictive law is also something to think about. Furthermore, it comes into question whether it would be even morally right to pass a law like that or would we be tampering with basic human rights, such as freedom of speech. This is an extremely complicated issue, one that is seemingly impossible to solve.

However, it is one that, as technology evolves with high speed, we soon need to address somehow. As people unaffected by this disgusting and humiliating new trend, it is easy to argue for freedom of speech, even if it includes creepshots. But it is worth trying to put ourselves in the shoes of the women in Massachusetts, trying to make a man "pay" for taking an upskirt photo of her, and seeing him walk away without even a warning.